Unit 2

Physical activity is very significant to a teen’s health. It is recommended that one gets at least an hour of physical activity as it helps to keep one’s mind sharp and causes one to feel better in general. It also lowers the risk of obesity, heart disease, type 2 diabetes and depression. Healthy eating is also important to a person’s mental and physical health. When you eat healthy food, it causes you to feel more alert and less sluggish. It also helps to your body working at its best. Sadly, media affects our food choices more than teens might consciously notice. When teens see models and celebrities on TV that are as thin as twigs, they start to feel bad about our own body size. This might cause them to start eating less or dieting.

Healthy Relationships

A healthy relationship must have seven qualities: mutual respect, honesty, communication, trust, support, equality and separate identities. Without these seven things, the relationship will start to become more of an obligation to fill than a privilege to have. If or when that happens, it won’t be long before the relationship could be brushing abusiveness. It’s difficult for teens to have long term relationships as they are still growing and interests are constantly changing.

Bullying

Bullying is something that may affect anyone, anywhere. There are four types of bullying: physical, emotional, verbal and , the newest form, cyber-bullying. Some may argue that cyber-bullying is the worst of the four because not only can the bully be anonymous, they can also bully someone at any time of any day while sitting miles away in their bedroom. Bullying can be a huge problem and lead to depression, self-harm and even suicide if not prevented. One reason of bullying may be that the bully does not even realize they are bullying someone. Another reason could be that the bully grew up in a situation where someone was constantly bullying someone else and the bully just believes that bullying is acceptable.

Alcohol and Drugs

Drugs, especially ecstasy, are very dangerous as you never really know what your getting. Drugs aren’t something you anyone can just look at and know what’s in it. You also have no idea how your body might react. Taking drugs is a bad idea. Another bad thing is drinking alcohol, especially large amounts. Teens brains are still developing and should be exposed to the degrading substances in alcohol, thus a legal drinking age. Consuming large amounts of alcohol, however, is bad for anyone, no matter what age they are. The more you drink, the less aware of everything you become. You won’t necessarily know that you are drinking more or that you’ve been even affected by the alcohol once you’ve become drunkenly impaired. If everyone in your company is just as drunk as well, who’s going to be the one to tell you it’s a bad idea to drive home. Once your driving, you start to put everyone else in danger. To me, drinking until your drunk and not having a designated driver or someone staying sober, as well as taking drugs, is an incredibly stupid idea. The fact people think that doing either of those to things and believing they won’t have consequences astonishes me.

STI’s

STI’s are a big problem, especially if you don’t know you have one. An STI will not necessarily have any physical symptoms.However, with the right tactics, I believe contracting one can be easily avoidable. Abstinence is one of the more obvious evasions and, in my opinion, is very practical given the age of teens. Another option is to be tested for STI’s and act accordingly. Have you partner be tested to as it will make no difference that you’re clean if they’re not. Something else that can be done is not ever having unprotected sex, whatever the kind. All of these things are easily doable and, in the long run, will be a benefit.